Horticultural and botanical musings from the Rockies, Great Plains and beyond. In humble tribute to Goddess Flora.

Sunday, November 6, 2016

A garden near lake Tekapo

The crevice garden of Michael Midgley

Just a few years old, this crevice garden was designed and built by Michael Midgley, a delightful outdoorsman who hosted Jan and me last week on my tour of New Zealand. Michael and his wife Wilma have operated various businesses in the Tekapo area for decades, and Michael had a large complex of gardens around a guesthouse complex they owned and recently sold: he's concentrated his energies on this smaller, but very densely planted crevice garden and its nearby borders: the nearly 100 pictures that follows were taken literally in a matter of minutes before we sat down to a sumptuous meal. I've had many a tour in many a country--the New Zealanders are second to none in hospitality and generosity. Their gardens are unbelievably diverse: the modified Maritime climate (bordering on steppe here in Tekapo) permits a range of planting options that quite frankly are almost depressing to those of us who live where subzero cold is more common and hotter, drier summers strain true alpines. You really have to be here to believe it!

Lewisia cotyledon

Helianthemum numullarium

Rhododendron 'Elizabeth', R. 'Mayday' and others

California
iris--mostly I. douglasiana (probably a seedling). He has grown scads
of these: his old house still has vast stands. From a sales
table--labeled a PC.

Euphorbia myrsinites: classed as noxious in Colorado, I saw it in a pot in the alpine house at Kew! Invasive is highly relative.

Blog Archive

Current Favorites

Picture of the month

Galanthus nivalis 'Viridapice'

February 21, 2018

Many of you have the impression that everything is always blooming always lovely in Denver. I suppose I have done a pretty good job of fooling you: last Sunday we had nearly 70F--and I was out in the garden, cutting back grasses and planting 200 pots of seedlings. By Monday morning the temperature had dropped to -4F (From 20C to -20C!). Such are the joys of the steppe climate. What are the chances my Mume which was opening its first flowers on Sunday has not been blasted?